Margvelashvili: Georgia's Top Challenge Is Russian Policy

Georgian President Giorgi Margvelashvili says that the main challenge of the country is dealing with the Russian policy, highlighting that Georgia's northern neighbor carries out hybrid, propagandist and informational war against Georgia.

Margvelashvili made the statement at the NATO PA 97th Rose-Roth Seminar in Batumi, held on April 23.

He said that Russian policy is not a challenge for Georgia and Ukraine alone, but is also so for other states.

“Georgia is facing a propaganda war and through this process [Russia] seeks to split the public through social media and other formats…Russia chooses the problem in the country in the process of the propaganda war, radicalizing society and the environment. We cannot give up our democracy in the face of this challenge and we must create joint messages related to these issues," Margvelashvili said, calling on other states to unite in the fight against hybrid wars.

The Georgian President underlined that people living on the territories of Russian-occupied Abkhazia and South Ossetia are Georgian citizens, regardles of who controls the areas at present.

“We will overcome the barbed wire fence reality, just like the Germans managed to destroy the Berlin Wall,” he added.

By Thea Morrison